So I got in to it with God boy... This is an old and tired debate to me but I indulged a bit.
I'm still dumbfounded and waiting for his (mcgrew's) response. My nick is panZ in this...
Theism (4.00 / 2) (..403)
by mcgrew
I believe in God mainly because He has manifested Himself to me. I have witnessed miracles. I know God. Perhaps I am insane.
However, there are questions that, for now, only religion can answer.
What is consciousness? What is sentience? Why is it there? How can a being that can even ask these questions exist? Does it really seem likely to anyone that the pyramids, skyscrapers, automobiles, laptop computers, are only accidents of entropy?
The aformentioned laptop, which was fashioned by humans, is incredibly complex, with millions of microscopic transistors (each an accident of entropy, in the athiest's view). But compared to the humans who designed and built them, they are laughingly simple. Yet they are fashioned by a consciousness, and we are not?
The very idea is so mind boggling as to be laughable.
laughable? (none / 0) (..694)
by panZ on Sat <--------------- Me
Why is the idea that your laptop is a result of entropy laughable? Please note that I'm not even discussing the existence of a god or personification of the universe and what consciousness is. Assigning human emotions and consciousness to the intangible needs of your mind is not critical to this debate. Only looking at the smaller parts of the big picture.
Is it laughable that, in the vast, nearly infinite expanse of our universe, that on some planet, some molecules formed amino acids, and that some amino acids formed a symbiotic relationship and became proteins, and that over time, these proteins also developed symbiotic relationships and made cells; then multi cell organisms; then specialized cells formed in small creatures; then larger creatures with even more highly specialized cells became efficient; developing clusters of organs and becoming mobile and interacting with their environment our; then creatures that created simple tools, then used simple tools to make more complex tools? Tools, like biology are a reaction of specialization which breads symbiotic dependency, efficiency and survivability. Is it so laughable that your laptop evolved from very simple tools and an organism's need just like a biological organism could have evolved from something very simple?
I'm not saying it did or didn't happened, just that the idea isn't laughable.
Moving on to the bigger picture; you argue that the laptop is so complex that is must have been designed by a conscious, intelligence. And you say that man is so complex that it must have been created by a conscious intelligence. By that reasoning, your god is so complex that he must have been created by some conscious intelligence. What created your god then? The "Intelligent Design" people out there have a recursive argument that is wholly fallacious once you think beyond the second iteration. The trouble is, none of them do. So who created your god? You did.
"I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than
you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours."
The problem.. (5.00 / 2) (..702)
by kitten
Is it laughable that, in the vast, nearly infinite expanse of our universe, that on some planet, some molecules formed amino acids, and that some amino acids formed a symbiotic relationship and became proteins, and that over time, these proteins also developed symbiotic relationships and made cells...
The problem with explaining this is that theists with a beef, and more specifically creationists, see the word "random" and absolutely latch onto it like a pitbull on a poodle. "How could the human body have formed 'randomly'?" they ask, all smirking, as though the postulation was that atoms sort of swirled together out of the void and "just so happened" to "randomly" arrange themselves into human form.
That very idea is what's laughable. Add that to the notion that interactions of matter are, by definition, not random, and it quickly becomes apparent that they literally do not have any idea what they're talking about.
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